List Of Bizarre Flight Delay Excuses

An article in the Independent recently talked about some of the most bizarre and weirdest reasons for flights being delayed or cancelled. Some flights have been delayed recently in the weirdest ways. These include a British Airways flight being stuck on the tarmac, because a mouse was seen on-board the aircraft and last week a Gatwick to Barbados flight was held up for over five hours, because the plane had run out of toilet roll.

The Independent’s Simon Calder recalled a Dubai to Heathrow flight where a litany of errors caused a flight to land at the wrong Airport, plus the airlines lack of help when the flight landed and passengers were forced to make their own way home.

One almost emergency landing aside (we were told to brace for an impact that didn’t happen), I’ve been pretty lucky in my flying life, with delays for only the most mundane reasons: passengers going AWOL, technical issues and weather. The only out of the ordinary delay I’ve had was a delay in the air in 2012, flying BA from Heathrow to Newark.

Going by the flight map, I thought our progress seemed interminable – headwinds were exceptionally strong, it turned out, so our flight took almost nine hours. By the time we reached Newark, it was late at night and there were, if I remember right, just three border force staff to greet us; we queued for around an hour, and emerged to find our luggage was still stuck in the plane, because the doors had iced over. I think I reached my hotel around midnight, instead of dinnertime. I’ve avoided Newark ever since.